We sit down with Tom Flesher and Noah Trudeau to talk about their JET SET session on using escape rooms to teach economics and statistics. Escape rooms are built around core economics concepts like opportunity cost and trade-offs. But Noah and Tom have taken it a step further and infused class-specific content into the clues that students need to solve to escape. Noah’s experience is based on a digital escape room he has used as a final exam review, while Tom describes how he has incorporated in-person, puzzle-based activities into his day-to-day classes. Together, they highlight how gamification can make economics more interactive and memorable for learners of all ages.
In this episode, we discuss:
* How escape rooms can model core economic concepts like opportunity cost and resource allocation.
* The difference between digital and in-person escape room formats in teaching.
* Using escape rooms as a comprehensive review for exams.
* The role of gamification in economics education for both traditional and non-traditional students.
* Benefits of fostering creativity, collaboration, and problem-solving through classroom games.
* And a whole lot more!
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Some show notes:
JET SET 2025 was packed this year, and we were only able to grab one interview while bouncing between sessions. Today’s episode may also be an Economics Happy Hour first: all four guests drank the same beer. We found a spot at Jack Patrick's Bar & Grill and each enjoyed Urban Chestnut’s Zwickle, a kellerbier that was perfect for the hot, humid St. Louis weather.
While there were a lot of great sessions at JET SET 2025, the one that stood out to us most was a session led by two of our friends, Tom Flesher (Suffolk County Community College) and Noah Trudeau (Troy University). The two of them were presenting on using escape rooms to teach economics. While Noah’s work focuses on a digital escape room experience, Tom’s approach uses in-person, hands-on puzzles to create immersive learning environments.
They first break down the basic structure of an escape room: teams race against the clock to solve interconnected puzzles. For educators, this is an easy connection to the core principles that are covered in early classes. Concepts like opportunity cost, trade-offs, and resource optimization are embedded in every decision students make during these activities. The problem-solving element of an escape room also mirrors the analytical and creative thinking economists need in real-world applications.
Noah shared his experience with a digital escape room project that he designed as a final exam review for a statistics course. He modeled his game partly on tabletop role-playing games, but the activity places students in a scenario where they solve problems drawn from the semester’s material. The format of his game encourages students to recall earlier lessons, collaborate, and engage actively to “get out” of the review session. Students found it a more memorable review than a traditional review of topics.
Tom shares his experience with gamification in a community college context, noting that there will always be people who dismiss it as “just playing games,” but he saw that this approach really resonated with diverse learners, including non-traditional students. He shared how game-based activities would spark “lightbulb moments,” where concepts click for students who might have struggled in more conventional lecture settings.
They wouldn’t give away what would happen in their session to protect the integrity of the game, but be on the lookout for a future paper from Tom and Noah about how they’re implementing escape rooms in the classroom. If you’re on the fence about gamifying your classroom (even if it isn’t escape rooms), Noah and Tom also shared some of the benefits they receive as professors who get easily burned out teaching the same topic multiple times each day.
This week’s pop culture references:
Since there were four voices on the episode, Matt and Jadrian stepped back from pop culture picks this week. Noah shared a favorite scene from Moneyball that he uses in his statistics class. In it, Billy Beane explains the idea of replacing Jason Giambi “in the aggregate.” He and his analytics guru talk about how to use statistics to think about substitutes when a single star player can’t be replaced directly.
Tom brought two examples from The Simpsons. The first was a spoof on a PBS donation campaign where Betty White calls out free riders, those who watch but don’t donate. She considers them “a common thief” who makes her furious.
Tom also shared his favorite clip from The Simpsons that he uses to kick off his macroeconomics course. In it, Homer reminds us (and himself) that money can be exchanged for goods and services.
